The Awesomeness of Being

As many of you know we journal almost every day. I thought this entry worthy of sharing.......And now a few words from Larry. Love, Charlotte

Every once in a while, I need a wake-up call, a call to pay closer attention. Too easily do I slide back into mediocrity, drifting along on the stream of life without putting my oars in the water. That call came to me recently from an unlikely source - from a novel that I was reading. In it, the protagonist was utterly convinced by the antagonists that his wife, whom he dearly loved, had been brutally murdered. He lived with the agony of that knowledge for a day or so before he discovered that it had been a cruel hoax, he had found her alive and unharmed. He was so overcome with joy and gratitude at the sight of her that he couldn't seem to get enough of her - the feel of his palm on her cheek, the smell of her hair, the little smile wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, the sound of her voice.


Would that we react that way every time we see a loved one, keeping in mind that they could be taken away in an instant. Oh, I know, we can't live our lives with that kind of dread but we can dwell a little longer over a cup of coffee with our loved one, listen to them more attentively, look at them with "seeing" eyes in order to imprint their image on our brain. Maybe turn off the TV and simply "be" with them.


What about the other side of the coin - What if you left this earthly plane today? Do you still have your "music" in you? Have you said everything you want to say to a loved one? Told them how important they are in your life? Have you apologized for a harsh word, perhaps asked for forgiveness? Just as meaningful, when's the last time you touched a baby, smelled their sweet baby smell, dwelled at the sight of a bed of flowers, noticed the smell of the rain on hot pavement, watched puffy clouds drift by or savored the taste of a freshly picked tomato? When's the last time that you looked at yourself in the mirror and said, "I love you"?


I'm present God. I'm listening. I'm seeing. I am Being.

Headed to Shirttail Canyon

We arrived in Chicago Park, California on Tuesday, June 29. Decided to work around the ranch for a few days before heading off to prospect. It's been pretty warm in these parts. Our first few days were spend weeding, rototilling, weedeating, mowing and moving sprinkler lines.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Tofte Ranch
It seems to be chilly here most mornings but it can sure warm up during the day. Where will we be this time tomorrow? This is our first D-Day (Departure Day) of the season. We are headed to Shirttail for 4 days.

LATER - Shirttail Canyon - Devil's Falls (We renamed it Angel Falls years ago). It's HOT and we are lazy and sleepy. It's about 10 degrees hotter in the canyon that up in Colfax.

My Bank Account Of Time

Today is my father’s birthday, June 12. He would have been 97 today if he hadn’t died about 12 years ago. In thinking about his passing which some people wouldn’t call untimely since he was 85 years old, I am reminded of others whose passing could be called untimely. Our friend, Judi Blake was in her 50’s when she died suddenly in her sleep, another friend, also named Judy is nearing her transition at a relatively young age. I once performed unsuccessful CPR on a fellow worker who was 32. We recently heard about a small child who succumbed to leukemia. I bring up all this to remind myself that we come into this human existence with a finite “time” in the “bank of this Life”. When we are young, we spend it unconsciously, if not recklessly, because it feels like we are immortal. But, as we continue to age, we begin to grasp the importance of time in all of it’s contexts. When I passed 50 years, I realized that realistically, my bank account of time was at least 50% empty. As I approach 70, about 75% has been spent, with luck. We never know how much time we are each allotted. Each day represents a “draw” from our “time” account without being able to check the balance. We can’t save some time for a rainy day – it gets spent whether or not we want to. We could lock ourselves in a dark room for 24 hours, not doing anything and it would still get lived. So my lesson for today is to spend each day by living fully, totally present, enjoying each moment as the rich and precious gem that it is. Our dear friend, Mari, wrote us yesterday. It was her birthday. Her words touched us deeply and I would like to share them with you.

"It is my birthday today, so I am taking the opportunity to move slowly and listen more closely than usual to "what wants to happen" today."

Good words to live by.....Larry

Our Plans for the Summer ~2010

As most of you know our housesit in Sutherlin, Oregon is coming to an end next week. We'll still be in Oregon for a couple of more weeks but then we are headed off for another adventure. We have had several inquiries with regard to our plans and wanted to share some of what our intentions are.

The theme for this summer could be many things -
The Great Summer Experiment OR
Our Vision Quest OR
How Much "Stuff" Does It Take To Be Happy? OR
How To Get Back to Our Heart Place OR
Who Are Larry & Charlotte & Why Are They Here?

We attended a wonderful class in Roseburg, Oregon earlier this year. It was called "The Quest for Wholeness: Healing Ourselves, Healing Our World".

To learn more about the book, you can click in the link to the right below "some of our favorite books".
We have had a wonderful spiritual teacher in Donna Smith and a wonderful group to share and grow with. It has been a remarkable and awakening experience that set us on a path of questions ..... that led us to this jumping off place. Our intention for our summer is to continue "our quest for wholeness".

Before we go on, we have a story we want to tell you. Some of it you may know but not all and we want to speak to you from our hearts. We have been reading through 30 years of journals and looking at photos these last few weeks and in doing that we have made many discoveries or perhaps, the truer statement is to say that we have remembered a lot of things that we had somehow forgotten over the years.

When we met, over 31 years ago, we were both working at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory in California. We had very good paying jobs. We lived for Fridays and dreaded Mondays; returning to jobs that felt like drudgery - a week of mundane activities and shuffling papers. (Larry had worked at the lab almost 20 years as a scientific programmer when I met him) When we met, we found that we shared similar dreams of moving to the woods and living by the sweat of our brows with some brains thrown in. We went off to live those dreams together in 1981. Probably, neither of us would have attempted it alone but together we felt that we could do anything. We dreamt of writing about our adventures and at the time I had a dream of becoming a successful artist.

Benjamin Franklin said, "Write something worth reading or do something worth writing about". Our intention was to cover both of those bases. We have done a lot of living in our 30+ years together. I wish we had a record of the location of every bed we have slept in. Some of the things we are really passionate about are traveling, adventures and writing about our experiences.

Our very first home together was on the banks of the North Fork of the American River above Chimney Rock. Lots of people hiked the trails during the day and we wanted more privacy so about a week later we moved up to Shirttail Creek below Yankee Jim Road. These were huge pack-ins since we set up a kitchen for long term camp outs and all of our camping gear and mining gear.

From a Mormon hymnal dated 1862:

I heard of gold at Sutter's mill
At Michigan Bluff and Iowa Hill
But never thought it was rich until,
I started off to prospect.
At Yankee Jim's I bought a purse,
Inquired for Iowa Hill, of course,
And traveled on, but what was worse,
Fetched up in Shirt-tail Canyon.
At Iowa Hill they buried me,
In the Catholic cemetery,
Underneath an old pine tree,
Now I no longer prospect.
Yet from below the gravestone cold,
I think about the days of old,
Still yearning for the days of gold,
When I went off to prospect.

On Shirttail Creek Larry built us a wonderful camp. We worked hard, cooked over an open fire and slept under the stars. Young love was wonderful - beyond our wildest dreams.

In October of '81 the rains moved in and we spent one night slowly washing away below our tarp as the torrents of water came down off of the hills. Thank goodness a caretaking position was not too far in our future. Winter on the creek was looking a little harder than we expected. It wasn't too many days after that we moved up to King's Hill just outside of Iowa Hill, California.

When we headed for the river, we went in search of a simple life that required very little money. We were on a journey to discover who we were without all of the trappings. How much does a person really need to own to be happy? We lived by the sweat of our labor without the security of a savings account, a regular pay check or health insurance. Some people thought we were foolish. Some of our family members thought we had lost our minds. Who, in their right mind, would leave good jobs, and years of education and go off to live in the woods?

Our new home, King's Hill, was 3000 acres of forestland owned by a group of land investors who lived in the Bay Area. It was remote to say the least. We actually had a cabin but there was no phone, electricity or running water, unless you ran down the hill to get a bucket of water at the spring. Or, I almost forgot, in the winter rain water did run off of the roof and into our aluminum boat and we bucketed water out of that . We lived mostly off of gold for those first 7 years.... gold, walnuts and firewood. We had 40 acres of dry land walnuts to tend and we got the crop in exchange for caring for the orchard - at least what was left over from the ground squirrels and the bears. We thrived on the hard physical labor of hauling water, cutting firewood, building fires, shoveling snow, hunting for food, mining for gold and even washing clothes by hand.

If we had a "poor" week we ate beans - if we had a "rich" week we ate steak and drank wine. We ate a lot of beans in the beginning but it made the steak and wine experiences all the more delicious. What we discovered in a very short time is how much we had taken for granted and how many of the pleasures of our lives we had missed because we were walking through so much of life in a semi-conscious state. We thrived on the challenge of making ends meet - seeing how little money we could live on and still be happy.... sometimes deliriously happy. We had very little "stuff" . We chose not to sell our souls to the devil for a $ so that we could buy more "stuff". Our greatest extravagance was the purchase of books.

We chose the "road less traveled" and it has made all the difference. We have traveled the highways and bi-ways, had amazing adventures and experiences, met wonderful people and spent long summers camped out in the woods. Our pursuits have brought us moments of great peace and exhileration but we have also been presented with challenges and obstacles to overcome; illness, injuries, homelessness. We can always find a place to camp and hang our hats.

We have lived an extraordinary life and adventure but we have never found a way to make a living doing it. I think that we made up the story that we could choose to suffer through in the corporate world and make good money or we could live the life we dreamed about and live on the edge. We did not dream of making lots of money. We dreamt of living life off of the land, in the wilderness. We dreamt of a simple life where we could discover the essential facts of life. We used to tell folks that we had read Thoreau one too many times because we made a conscious decision "to go to the woods, to front the essential facts of life and see if we could learn what it had to teach, and not when we came to die, discover that we had not lived".

A friend asked us once if we had taken an oath of poverty. It seemed an odd question at the time but after consideration, we had to answer "yes". Basically we did take an oath of poverty. We went in search of a simple life that required very little money. We were on a journey to discover who we were without all of the trappings. It has been an amazing and wonderful adventure. Periodically, we would drop back in for a few months and get "jobs"; working for a National RV guide visiting all of the privately owned campgrounds in California selling advertising, working for the census, Hickory Farms, working as organic farmers for 8 years, caretaking, paintings houses, digging ditches.

As we have traveled our path, we have shared our journey with others but not in an organized way. This journey is a process of ups and downs and all arounds. There are paths to walk, mountains to climb, rivers to cross and rivers to navigate. There are challenges and some rough roads. But, there are also wonders to behold and many gifts and blessings to be had along the way. One never knows what is around the next bend. It is a journey of discovery and awakening.

We lost a dear friend last month. Judi was 50 years old. She was a very successful and brilliant business woman. When we spoke to her in February she said that she was in the process of reorganizing her life because she didn't have enough time for fun and family. She was in apparently good health but she went to sleep on a Saturday night and never woke up again. Her husband, David, discovered her the next morning. I cannot imagine the pain of that for David.

What we learned from Judi's passing is that you can run out of time while you are trying to find more time. You can run out of life while you are living for that "someday". You can run out of days while you are chasing after the dream, instead of embracing the journey. When we were young, we thought we had all the time in the world. Larry will be 70 this year and I will be 60. As one gets older, one becomes more aware of their clock ticking. If one wakes up, one finds that things that have been important, lose their importance. Your priorities change.

We are seeing things very differently these last few weeks. We realize that "stuff" can still own you, if you aren't careful. Dreams of ownership; whether it be a home, car, RV, the latest gadget, lots of clothes, toys, stuff, stuff and more stuff, etc., the illusion of security - they all cost us time. So we are asking ourselves how do we want to spend our time, and in the end, will it really be worth it? This is a very personal decision for each individual. That is where we are.... taking a close look at how we want to "spend" our lives..... our time on this planet. It's just like money in the bank except we don't know how much we have. We want to be fully awake instead of lost in our delusions and illusions.

This is what we know for sure - we left our jobs in 1981 because we did not want to live lives "of quiet desperation"...

"Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them."

Henry David Thoreau

We want to live each day to the fullest. We still have hopes and dreams but we are not exactly sure what they are any longer. We got lost along the way and started marching to the drums of other people. We are igniting our fire once again. It has just been a glow of embers for awhile now. We almost forgot that it was even there. The fire of life burns from the glow of passion in our hearts. What are we really passionate about? Why are we here?

I won't say that we lost our way. We made the perfect detour to learn the lessons we came here to learn but now we return to "our woods".

We know that the way to get back to our heartplace is to spend lots of time alone in the wilderness ~ walking through the woods, sitting by the campfire at night, sleeping under the stars, writing, meditating and just being still in the sights, sounds and fragrance of nature.

When were were farming we used to go out to the pond and see how long we could sit there in total silence just noticing our surroundings..... counting birds, so to speak. It was an amazing experience. We haven't done anything like that in a long time. We know that it is in the silence that our Divine Source speaks to our hearts.

It feeds our souls. We are headed to California in the next few week to do just that. We will be calling Tofte Ranch our home base but our intention is to spend long periods of time camped out and backpacking. We have an invitation to spend time on a gold mining claim way up in the high country. It is a place where we have spent many summers all alone and look forward to time there again. There are also many other options for us that we will be exploring. We will post to our blog often throughout the summer and look forward to sharing our adventures.

We aren't sure of our departure date at this point but our intention is to head south somewhere around the first part of July. We are planning to spend about a week working at Tofte Ranch down in Chicago Park, California before heading out for the wilderness. Happy trails until next time.........

Good Thoughts For Friday ~ Making a Shift

I am sharing this because ordinarily I might chew on this bone all summer or at the very least a month or a week. It would take awhile and alot of 'gnashing of teeth" before I would be able to make a shift. (that is what I recently learned - I am a grinder and a clincher and that has really had an affect on my teeth and now my dentures) With regard to my teeth and finding out two weeks ago that I needed $1750.00 in dental work, it took less than 12 hours to make a shift in thinking (with the help of our dear friend, Sally). After we recovered from the shock of the bill we went to gloom and doom. I think this is a habit!

We found out yesterday that these folks are going to put this house on the market this summer so our "permanent" long term housesit may be coming to an end. With regard to this housesit, possibly ending before next fall, it took less than 24 hours with help from our dear friends. Larry & I are very grateful. Yesterday morning I was running around doing my version of "Chicken Little". Larry will tell you that I am very good at playing "Chicken Little" (see notes below). Thank you God, thank you Universe, thank you everyone who helped us in this shift of consciousness!

Old way of thinking..... oh, my goodness what are we going to do NEXT October. Keep in mind, this house may not sell and we may come back here next October! Only God knows!

Old Charlotte: Let's worry about it all summer. Let's chew this bone to pieces.

Larry: Let's worry about it occasionally - Larry has always been better than me at this faith and trust thing (except when I was sick for all of those years). Then he took his turn laying awake night after night.

Now, I may have given up this "where are we going to live" worry at some point. It would be like the child that gets tired of touching the stove and getting burned, so I would finally "cease and desist".

New thoughts for Friday - As I was writing in my journal this morning I wrote "we found out yesterday that they are going to put this house on the market this summer". What does that mean? Who knows? I always want my ducks in a row but the fact is that, who knows where the ducks are and even if I get them in a row they often fly off. It is a constant struggle trying to keep them lined up. So, what good does it do me to try to keep lining them up all the time?

We probably won't know what is going on with this house until sometime next September. That is 4 months away! Do I want to worry about this situation, this unknown situation for 4 months??? NO!!!

We are headed to California once the census ends and we finish with our business in Oregon. We are going off to work at Tofte Ranch and go gold prospecting and camping and backpacking (as far as we know) and who knows what else! We are very excited!

By next September, maybe we won't even want to come back to this house! By then we may have found 3 pounds of gold or our websites might be generating a nice income, or maybe we will want to go to Arizona or Nevada prospecting or maybe we will want to go down to Southern California to work with our web master, marketing guru, mentor and teacher. Who knows??? Maybe we'll come back up here to get our own place. So many things could happen between now and then. So many things......

Let go..... follow the thread.... be quiet ..... be stilll..... it is all happening in a perfect way. We can't wait to see what is going to unfold as the days pass! YES! This or something better. Thank you God! Thank you God! Thank you God!

 Interesting facts about "Chicken Little"!

The Sky Is Falling, better known as Chicken Licken, Henny Penny or Chicken Little is an old cumulative tale and fable about a chicken (or a hare in early versions) who believes the sky is falling. The phrase, "The sky is falling," has passed into the English language as a common idiom indicating an hysterical or mistaken belief that disaster is imminent.

The origin of the story is usually associated with many of the Aesop's Fables, The basic motif and many of the elements of the tale can also be found within the Daddabha Jataka (J 322). The Jatakas comprise a large body of folklore dating from around Gautama Buddha's time (6th century BC) to the third century AD. However, this ancient version features a hare as the central character rather than a chicken, and the wise protagonist is a lion (the Bodhisattva or future Buddha).[

Depending on the version, the moral changes. In the "happy ending" version, the moral is not to be a "Chicken", but to have courage. In other versions the moral is usually interpreted to mean "do not believe everything you are told". In the latter case, it could well be a cautionary political tale: The Chicken jumps to a conclusion and whips the populace into mass hysteria, which the unscrupulous fox uses to manipulate them for his own benefit, sometimes as supper.

Shadow Spirits

"Our Father is the Sky!
Our Mother is the Earth!
Our Life is our song!
May our Songs Create joy!
May our Children always Smile."
Two Feathers

Mother Father God, I thank you for this morning......the dew, the golden light and gentle breeze that greets me this day. The lilting notes of the songbird. It is a blessed and glorious day.

Why do we choose to make things feel bad.....feel hard.... with our thoughts and words? These negative thoughts and words take a blessed endeavor and turn it into a hard and unfulfilling task. I am reminded of "yard work". I love to spend time in the out-of-doors tending the plants, gathering the crops, pulling the weeds, tilling the soil, smelling the sweetness of what grows there but as soon as I turn it into "work" it becomes a chore instead of a meditation......my special time of being with Mother Earth. Why do I do that? Do I need to slave and suffer for a reason? Why cannot I take pleasure from this task? I see that I do this with many of the daily tasks of life. Why? Where does this self-talk come from that makes it hard? Why does life have to be hard? Who made up that rule? And, must I believe it?

I think of food and eating. Why do we use "good" or "bad" to describe the act and experience of eating food. If we eat too much, it is neither good nor bad. We ate too much and now we feel discomfort. That is all. Perhaps we will choose not to do that again and perhaps we will. If we choose those foods that give us pleasure why is it bad? Food gives us pleasure and I am thankful for that gift.......the cold melting sweetness of ice cream as it touches my tongue, the smell and taste of roasted meat cooked over the fire, the fragrance of the ripe peach picked fresh from the tree. These are all gifts. I am grateful for the gift of the food which I will eat this day to nurture my body and spirit .....and I am thankful to all of those who labored to make these gifts available to me.

I live in my body temple. My spirit resides here and experiences the earth because of this temple. When the body is no more, the spirit will leave. I will choose to eat and drink of that which nourishes me and makes me strong today.

I use these words of judgement and condemnation with regard to many of my thoughts and actions. Why? Why must I judge myself so harshly? Why must I make myself feel bad? Who are these shadow spirits who whisper in my ear? My judge and jury, whom I allow to condemn me for my thoughts and actions. These spirits would hold me in this place.

I was taught as a young child to listen for the shadow spirits by the shadow people who were in my life. The voices whisper in my ear from their perch on my shoulder....seeking to climb into my mind, heart and spirit and pull me back into the darkness with the other shadow spirits. They do not like change......They do not like being in the light. If I shine my light upon them, they will return to the darkness.

A few days ago I picked up pen and paper and wrote about these shadow spirits...... each time they spoke to me I wrote down the date, time and the words in my notebook. I continued to write throughout the day .....each time the critic, judge and jury spoke to me of my thoughts and deeds, I wrote it down. This shadow did not like that the world could see what I was listening to. Is it male or female? Mine seems to be more male. It is the compilation of all the voices that spoke to me when I was small.......the voices of those who could not escape from their own shadow spirits. It is my showdow self that has learned to live in that darkened world. They would judge me and tell me I was not good enough.......they would have me believe that I could not escape the darkness. I gave them power for all these years by listening but I have taken away the power by writing it down. By shining my light on their words, I have driven them back into the dark shadows. It is strange, for I now feel something like love emanating from the darkness ....and some fear. Is it the love of my mother who could not escape from her darkness? Is it her fear of what will happen to me if I live in the light? That brings me to this page and this place.

There are other spirits and guides waiting for me to now....they are loving, caring energy spirits waiting to speak.....They have been waiting for me to stop listening to the voices in the shadows. They are from the Greater One. They say "You are good, you are a child of the One. Be all that you can be. You are capable of so much more than you could ever imagine. Thank your shadow spirits for what they have taught you, for it is only by traveling through the darkness that you can come to the light. You no longer have need of their words or their judgement AND you no longer have need of the darkness."

I choose to let go and move into the light of Love. I am good....you are good.....I am loved......you are loved......I have let go of the past that would hold me. Let go of your past as well. Be in this moment......let love and all that is good enfold you. We came here with a song to share......begin to sing your song today.

"May my life be my song and may my song create joy".

Gold Adventure 2010

Thursday, April 22, 2010

For everyone that keeps asking, YES, plans are underway for another summer of gold prospecting. We'll head down California way. We are planning to be down that way almost 3 months. We are already assembling equipment and working on the lists of supplies. Since I am going to be working here in Sutherlin, Oregon for the next 2 months, I want to get a start with getting ready for this trip. We are planning some lengthy wilderness campouts. It will be great to get to the backcountry and away from civilization once again. There is lots of great new prospecting equipment and tools these days so I am in the process of doing research for this next gold prospecting expedition.

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived" --Henry David Thoreau


I know there are those who think we are foolish to be going off, on yet another gold adventure, at our age. Remember, "you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something--your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever." I leave all of you with a few wise words from Steve Jobs ~ see article below.

Do What You Love: Time Is Too Short To Do Anything Else

Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and Pixar Animation Studios, delivered a truly inspirational commencement address to some 5,000 Stanford University graduates. Without further adieu, his message:

"I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The First Story is About Connecting the Dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife.

Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: 'We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?' They said: 'Of course.' My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition.
After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed.

Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them.

If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something--your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My Second Story is About Love and Loss.

I was lucky--I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents' garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation--the Macintosh--a year earlier, and I had just turned 30.

And then I got fired.

How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down--that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me.

I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me--I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

Fired From Apple

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the world's first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful-tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it.

Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers.

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My Third Story is About Death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: 'If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right.'

It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: 'If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?' And whenever the answer has been 'No' for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything--all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure--these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

Diagnosed With Cancer

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer.
I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months.

My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery.

I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it.

And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma--which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch.

This was in the late 1960s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and Polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue.

It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: 'Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.' It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much."

The Stanford (University) Report June 14, 2005

The Journey

"I am on a journey to awaken, Today my sacred journey starts, Take my hand and you can travel with me, On this sacred journey to the heart."
(Words and music by Richard Burdick)

The Great Gold Adventure 2009

Saturday Morning, August 22, 2009
Tofte Ranch
Chicago Park, CA

We have now been at Tofte Ranch for 18 days. We are near Colfax, CA working on a small ranch. Our big project since arriving has been painting the barn. Actually, getting the barn ready to paint was the big job; power washing, scraping, wire brushing and then caulking. We are happy to report that the barn is almost done. We only have about 30 minutes of trim painting on the barn and we will be finished!!!! Yahoo! We'll do that tomorrow morning, when it is cooler. It has been a long go to get it done, especially in all of this heat but then we knew it would be hot when we agreed to come down and work. It is still morning and already 91 in Colfax right now. Add to the barn, dealing with a pig dying - pig hospice, harvesting crops 3 times a week for the Grower's market, moving sprinklers in the pasture, weeding, weeding and weeding. At least we know that we are in pretty good shape for our trip now. The pasture out front is a beautiful emerald green and when we arrived it was brown. Larry has done a wonderful job with the watering program. He's been running about 12 - 15 sprinkler heads a day plus watering in the garden and he moves all of those lines every day. He has also prepared and planted a huge raised bed of chard for fall harvest. Oh, 3 calves were born since we arrived; Panda, Bear and Black Jack. We are now calling them the 3 musketeers. They are a frisky fun group. We have put in some long hard hours and know for certain we could not have done this without our Ambrotose, Sport, Bounce Back and Firm....... had to throw in some Advil from time to time.

We just got back from Auburn where we picked up the last of our gear for the great Gold Adventure 2009. We purchased 2 garden kneeling pads ( a great tip from Jay and MaryAnn from their kayaking adventures). They'll soften those gravel bars and rocks where we'll be sitting. They were laughing at us at K-mart because we tried all the pads to see how they sit. We picked up a couple of blue graniteware cups for water and tea (yep, we are leaving the coffee behind and wine). We picked up some great treking poles at Big 5. I got a great windup LED flashlight - very light and compact for those late night trips to the potty.

Larry's pack is all loaded up except for a few small incidentals. It weighs in at 70 pounds with the raft and wet suits. My gear is almost packed up. I am carrying the food and clothes, first aid, supplements, etc. Thanks to MaryAnn's suggestion, everything is in zip lock bags and neatly packed and organized. Everything that we want to keep dry will go into the dry bags at the river, once we start floating. We are taking journals but no reading material and there will be no computer, email or cell phone. That's quite a few changes to our daily routine.

Our friend, Arlene, will drop us at the Stevens Trail in Colfax about 8 AM Monday morning and then pick us up the following Saturday at about 4 PM at the Iowa Hill Bridge at Mineral Bar. It is 4 1/2 miles down to the North Fork of the American. The trail ends at Secret Ravine. The good news is that we think we were given the wrong information about the distance we will be traveling down the river. We were told it was 7 miles and we now believe that we will only be floating about 4 miles. That means we won't have to break camp every day. We thought about going down to the next bridge but that would add on another 5 miles to the float trip. We want to spend most of the day sniping on the river. Extending our trip would require we move camp almost every day. We agree this shorter trip is better. We have never traveled this section of the river so every day will be something new. I'm one of those folks who likes to have everything planned out but we have no idea where we will camp, etc. It'll be nice if we only have to break camp and move a couple of times - more time for sniping.

Well, that's about all I know tonight. It feels good to know that we are almost to departure time. I wish I had taken photos of all of our gear and supplies layed out because I can't believe it is all packed away. We are glad we have tomorrow to rest up a bit before we leave. We will take photos on Monday before we head down the trail. Well have a still camera and a video camera and will document our adventure. We are already planning our next backpack/float trip.

Why are we going on this journey?

American River Adventure 2009 ~ Day 1

Monday, August 24, 2009 North Fork of the American River, California - Wild and Scenic Area

Charlotte: Monday Evening - TIRED, TIRED, TIRED. Our friend Mo came over about 6:30 AM to make sure that we had a ride to the Stevens Trail in Colfax. She helped us finish packing; including pain pills (in case we break something) and Imodium D (good thinking, just in case). She made a quick trip home to grab more dehydrated food for us. We left the house by 7:15 with our friend, Arlene. Happy and excited good-bys at the trail head. "See you in 5 days".

It was a long hike in with Larry carrying 70 pounds and me carrying 40 pounds. The gear for prospecting is pretty heavy, including wet suits and tools. Larry has all of that gear in his pack. I have the food and toiletries.

I had read a description of the Steven's Trail that said, "It was not for the faint of heart." Boy, that was more true than I could imagine. The first 1 1/2 miles were pretty easy going. We found our first resting spot in an open area. There was a speed boat parked in the middle of the woods - how did it get here?!?! It proved a great spot to take off our packs and rest awhile. Once we reached the North Fork canyon the trail became fairly narrow and dropped straight down to the river below. I am guessing about 1000 feet. Since I have a terrible fear of heights, the sight of the the trail along the canyon wall was scary, to say the least. Larry turned and said, "OK, this is the deal. You keep your eyes on the trail at all times and only on the trail. If there is a wide place to stop and rest I'll tell you but otherwise just keep your eyes down and concentrate on the next step."

I never once looked away from the trail unless we stopped at a wide spot. Our next resting spot was back in the trees at a small spring trickling out of the hillside. It was nice to find some shade and there was a small ledge where we could remove our packs. When we headed out again it was a long, hard, hot trek to the river. As the morning wore on the temperatures climbed into the 90's. We thought we were in good shape but the heavy loads proved to be more than we realized. We were bone weary tired and hurting by the time we reached the river around 11:30. We were tuckered out. Our legs were shakey and weak and my back was screaming at me for the last 2 miles of travel. We rested for awhile on the bedrock in the shade of a small bush. It felt good to sit down without a pack on. Larry wound up with a blister on his big toe and I have one on the edge of my foot.

There was a miner at the foot of the trail. He lives down here! He finds some gold - not really sure how much. Apparently, he walks out about once a week or so unless people on the trail give him food. Amazing! He says he has been living down here a couple of years. Oh, my! We gave him some fruit and trail mix.

After resting and talking to Chuck we repacked all of our gear into the dry packs for our trip down river. Larry unpacked the raft and blew it up with the pump. We suited up in our wetsuits, packed the raft with our gear and tied it down and headed down river about 1 PM. We had a shallow set of rapids to navigate firt - HARD - lots of slipping down and banging of ankles and knees. After that there was a deep pool. It looked inviting but proved to be very strenuous going. The wind was blowing us upriver so swimming our raft through was almost impossible - really hard work. Larry was on the front and I was on the back. The pool was deep and only once in awhile, on the edge, could we get a foothold. We tried to hang on to the rocks and rest when we could. Our trekking poles proved to be the handiest last minute purchase we made. When we extend them to their full length they are about 6 feet long. They helped up keep our footing in the river and sometimes we could find bottom with the poles and push our way through the pools. Larry's pole broke as we made our last crossing of the river to what looked like a possible campsight. He really needs a stick.

We decided to pull out of the river about 3:00 because we were bone weary tired and Larry's treking pole broke into in the last pool. Our bodies were worn out and hurting. It was hot! We could see that there was another deep pool up ahead and now Larry has no pole. I spotted a sandy area down river just alittle ways so I hiked down to scout it out. There is a large pine tree so we'll have some shade. After a rest we portage our gear down to that spot. We get out our bedrolls so we can lay down and strip down to T-shirts and shorts. It feels good to just lay flat and be still. The air is hot but there is a slight breeze. It is interesting how aware of my body I am, the aches and pains, throbbing, perspiration, how the breeze cools me because of the sweat and how hot it feels when the breeze doesn't blow.

After resting for awhile Larry gets up to go look at something at the river's edge. When I ask what he is looking at, he announces "3 of the biggest piles of bear poop I have ever seen"!. I get up and pull our bedrolls up higher on the bank.

Later in the day Larry strips off and announces that he is going to hike back upriver and dive down in the last pool we crossed to retrieve the other end of his trekking pole. He thinks maybe it just came unscrewed. I get up and go with him. I have to see this! The water is very cold. Remember, we have had wetsuits on all day? His pole is black and silver. I do not see how he will ever find it. He jumps in the cold water and down he goes. He has to dive several times but finally he comes up with pole in hand. Unfortunately, it is broken. We decide to keep it and take it back to Big 5.

Larry: Monday Evening ~ Arlene dropped us off at the top of the Steven's Trail on the Colfax side just before 8 AM. Little did we know what lay ahead for us. The trek down to the river really stretched our physical endurance to the max. Our trip into the Grand Canyon comes to mind. Our legs shook from the exertion. My new hip/thigh held up pretty well though but both buttocks ached. I got a blister on my big toe. It took us about 3 1/2 hours to hike the 4 1/2 miles down to Secret Ravine. We collapsed on the bank of the river in total exhaustion. I don't think we could have gone another 100 feet! We just concentrated on our feet and our next step. It was far more frightening for C but bless her heart, she sucked it up and followed me along the narrow ledges that dropped off into space.

After resting awhile we slowly assembed our gear and inflated the raft. We loaded it up, tied everything down and headed immediately for our first rapids. Slowly, we inched our way through the rushing water until we reached the deep pool below. The deep pools are our hardest, as we can't touch the bottom so we just have to hang on to the raft and kick our feet. Very aerobic! We finally spied a decent looking camp spot and quit the river about 2:30. We were totally exhausted and decided to rest the remainder of the day. It was fairly hot so we had to follow the shade. Blessedly, the sun findly went behind the far ridge and it began to cool down. The water is very clear, the hillsides are dry and brown and the canyon walls soar to the sky.

It feels alien to be out here on the river bank, miles from civilization. It's been many years since we've slept beneath the stars beside the river. Our only concern is the 3 piles of bear poop in our camp - one pile being fairly fresh!

Photo Album Day #1  https://www.facebook.com/larryn.bacon/media_set?set=a.1162800984363&type=3

American River Adventure 2009 ~ Day 2

Tuesday, August 25, 2009
North Fork American River ~ Sunny


Charlotte: Tuesday Morning ~ This trip has been more difficult than I expected!!! Far more difficult! We are sitting here on our little garden kneeling pads facing the river. We have had our first cup of tea. It was a LONG night. I kept listening for the bear or bears. Each time we were both awake, I banged on our cooking pot a few times with the lid. Larry had the pot the first part of the night but I took over pot duty about 11 because he wasn't banging it often enough. By 1 AM the ground had grown hard and my body was aching. Actually, I should say really aching since it was pretty much aching since about half way down the trail. I had taken Sport before bed but I finally gave in and took some Advil.

On the positive side..... the stars were unbelievable. I saw at least 6 shooting stars. We were awake several times together during the night (Larry confessed in the night that he was also having some apprehensive thoughts about the bear). We even had one long conversation during the night ~ partly to discuss our sanity with regard to this trip. We agreed that we are glad we are doing it. We are just not sure why yet.

I am very thankful for the 4 pound porta potty that I hauled down here, even though I took some kidding about it. This old body doesn't squat quite as easily as it once did.

We layed down on our pads on the gravel bar about 7:30. We won't do that tonight. The old body only wants to lay on that hard ground for so long. Today we will start looking for gold. We have some great sniping tools that our friend Steve made.

Our dry packs are a bit of a challenge. Everything we need seems to always be in the bottom. We had a supper of Annie's Mac & Cheese with tuna. It was pretty darn good. We had to keep moving, to stay away from the meat bees, while we ate. We only had cheese and crackers for lunch, a small piece of pork and a protein bar for breakfast. We are sore, sore, sore this morning.

Later in the morning: I am sitting on the bank in my wetsuit waiting for Larry to find an interesting area to prospect. It is quiet and peaceful here ...... sitting with my feet in the water. Wow, that is a really deep hole in front of me! First thing this morning we went in search of another pole for Larry. He finds what is left of a dead alder at the waterline. He sawed it down with the saw in our swiss army knife and whittled it and now has a dandy 8 foot staff.

Mid-day: I hiked down the river in my wetsuit to where Larry was sniping to find out how he was doing. It was getting hot so I hiked our dry bags up in the trees, to keep them in the shade, before I left. We have some chocolate bars, cheese, etc. that we would like to keep out of the hot summer sun. We decide that it's time to think about moving down river. Larry isn't finding many colors and we now feel we must keep on the move to make the bridge by Saturday. We are marking our progress on the topo map but we won't know if we are correct until we arrive at the bridge. I came back to camp to gather everything together to load the raft. As I approach our campspot I hear the familiar chirp of a ground squirrel, signaling. I see ground squirrels at our dry packs - demon squirrels! When I get to the packs I find that they have torn holes in the food pack. They didn't actually get into the pack but 15 more minutes and they would have.Thank goodness or we might now be down in this canyon minus our food. They managed to pull out part of one of the ziplock bags with trail mix and scatter some on the ground. Thank you God that I came back when I did.

Later in the afternoon: We floated our gear down the river. It was pretty easy going. First there was a long pool, mostly knee deep with small saucer size rocks. Then we decided to hike everything down a long gravel bar/boulder pile . Then it's back in the river. It was pretty easy going after the overland trek because it was mostly gravel on the bottom. We come to an area that could be a good camp but it's early and there is no decent looking bedrock here for sniping. We keep going. We made it down a series of rapids before we quit.

At our new camp: It's been another hard day. Larry is off looking for gold. He seems driven to find something. I mean isn't that what this trip is all about? I hope he is finding gobs. I am sitting in the shade of the blue tarp that he put up before he left. We are in a new campspot. I am trying to stay out of the blistering sun. We are on the wrong side of the river for shade.

Larry sniped around camp most of this morning and found a few bits. The areas that were accessible had been worked pretty hard and in the other areas the bedrock was simply too deep. The camping part isn't hard. If we had a nice campspot with a little shade ~ fish a little, snipe a little. The really hard part is moving and hauling our gear. I will be so glad when I have some real shade. This new campsight has absolutely no shade. The shade is all across the river but there is no place to camp over there.

Like I have said several times, "Who would hike down the Steven's Trail for fun?"

Evening: Poor gold showing today. Day 2 ~ HARD ~ not much gold

Larry: Tuesday: Early morning ~ Sun hasn't hit our camp yet. Got out of our bed and made a cup of tea. We had a restless night, what with our aches and pains from yesterday and our trepidation over the bears. We hung our food bag and trash bag in a tree and took our cooking pot to bed with us. At odd hours throughout the night, we banged on the pot.

With a crescent moon that set early, we had the starry heavens for entertainment during our waking hours. I was reminded of all our carefree years sleeping out under the stars down at Shirttail and up on Duncan Creek. I tried to get in touch with the spirit of those people and realized that I was actually trying to recreate that adventurous quality in us. We had lost our fearlessness over the years, rather I should speak for myself - I had become old and fearful. I resist that aspect of myself mightely. I want to go out full of vigor and adventure, doing fun, challenging things in the time that I have. In that respect, I have an ideal partner in Charlotte. Not only does she love me enough to go along, she can also lead the way, as she embraces the same adventurous spirit.

I must admit that last evening, I had misgivings about this trip - in our ability to pull it off. The trek was approaching our physical limits and the trip down river was tough. Walking in the river was difficult but the deep pools were the hardest. But, after a night of rest, my spirits are restored and I'm looking forward to a day of sniping. I plan to work my way down one bank so far and then work the other side up past camp a ways before returning to camp.

In our new campspot - Evening ~ Two more portages today. Lots of difficult terrain. Plus, the crevices seem to all be cleaned out. I'm working hard to just get some color. We camped on a very narrow strip of sand. I carried more sand in my gold pan to build it up to accomodate our bed. Charlotte, bless her heart is bearing up under the strain but it's taking a toll. Falling and bruising her ankles and shins while walking the boat through rapids we didn't portage.

American River Adventure ~ Day 3

Wednesday Morning, August 26, 2009
North Fork American River ~ More Sun

Charlotte: Early Wednesday Morning: LONG night last night! Our bodies have really taken a beating. We are sore beyond belief. Even with 4 Advil I didn't sleep much because my whole body is sore and every time I moved the pain woke me up. I can't believe I didn't bring any Bounce Back. I thought this was going to be an easy stroll down the middle of the river. Instead, it is an experience in torture. The river is strewn with boulders most of the way - platter size to banana box size, slippery, laying at different angles. We made our way slowly with the raft trying to keep our footing but we have both fallen repeatedly. We are bruised and sore. Add to that, walking a mile or more each day in water that varies from knee deep to chest deep or even deeper. It doesn't seem far unless you are in the water. The deep pools are the hardest. The river is low and there is very little current, so we hang on to the raft and try to paddle our way through. Often there is a stiff wind that blows us in the opposite direction.

We learned the first day to stay near the bank so that we can find some footing on the bedrock once in awhile, when it's shallow enough to reach with our feet. It is very strenuous going through the deepest pools. Then there are the rapids - boulder fields with swifter moving water, pushing you along and you can't see where you are stepping. We portaged around a long series of rapids yesterday and a long pool on Monday. We made it through 2 areas of rapids and that was enough yesterday. We stopped at a less than ideal camp spot. We were exhausted. The sand was just wide enough for our bed and even that required more sand. Larry hauled several loads of sand in the gold pan. There was absolutely no shade of any kind. We didn't have any shade until after 6 PM. I am guessing that it was up in the 90's. There were no flat rocks to put our gear on. The night before we had some nice flat bedrock. Last night our bedroom was a long narrow area of sand, maybe 3 feet across and then a straight up rock wall that retained the heat of the sun long into the night. We were about 6 feet from the water. We learned not to put our bedrolls down until just before bed. The sand retains heat long into the night. This has been the most difficult and strenuous undertaking of my life. Larry says the same is true for him.

There is great looking bedrock all around. Larry spent 2 hours sniping after we made camp and only came up with a few colors. He says the area has been worked hard. It seems impossible since we are so far from a road or trailhead.

Later in the morning: We've had our tea and protein bars and have decided to move out as soon as there is sun on the water. We want to get our next move over with and hopefully we'll find a better camp with some shade this afternoon. We are hoping for a nice camp spot tonight ~ shade, sandy area for sleeping, flat bedrock for gear and sitting AND some gold would be nice. We figure we are about 1/3 of the way to the bridge at Mineral Bar. I think we would stay put a couple of days if we could find a good spot.

We can see up ahead and there is another rapids and then a big bend in the river. We are going to cross the river and portage around the rapids. We are praying for an easy trek today ~ sandy bottom, even cobbles would be OK. We saw a hiker way up on the trail just after 7 this morning and amazingly, 2 runners right at nightfall last night. We feel certain they were training for the Western States 100 mile run.

Pain and agony. We're not eating much. We took our first bath in the river last evening after the sun went behind the ridge ~ COLD water! We must remember to bathe while it is still sunny. We are in the water most of the day but shampooing and cleaning up with soap felt good ...... after we got out of the river and warmed up in the summer air.

Early afternoon ~ Thank you God! Finally, we have a wonderful camping spot. We are on a long expanse of cobble beach with nice sandy areas for our bed. We are on the south side of the river but there are several shade trees on the rocky ridge above us. There is even flat bedrock for our gear. Now, if there is just some gold. Larry is off sniping.

We set out early this morning. We rafted everything across the river and then changed into boots and portaged around the rapids. We decided to hike our gear as far as we could. We ran out of bedrock and a place to walk at the bottom of a deep pool ~ maybe 15 feet deep. We were thankful to be able to miss the rapids and having to swim through another deep pool with our gear. We could see another series of rapids farther down the river. We decided to take a rest after hauling all of our gear to this spot. The grotto-like pool with it's clear, deep teal colored water was amazingly beautiful. There are big leafed plants along the far side of the pool. We could see several large bass swimming around. We decided to change back into wetsuits and river shoes so that we could float our gear across the river and then portage our gear down below the next series of rapids. It seems like alot of work but it's much easier than making our way down the rapids in the river.

After we crossed the river we could see that there was actually a series of 3 rapids and then a long riffle so we decided to hike the gear down below the riffle, which was quite a distance.

We went high and up over the bedrock. Easy does it ~ slow and steady. How do we make our way down this river? One day at a time, one stretch at a time, one step at a time. That is what we decided last night when we felt so beaten and exhausted ~ we'll just have to take it one stretch at a time and if that is too much, just one step at a time. This river trip is like a metaphor for life; you never know what is around the next bend.

It took 2 trips each to get our gear below the riffles. One trip with packs and each carrying 2 bags of gear and then one trip with the raft and a light load of gear. Out of our boots and back into wetsuits and river shoes, load the raft and we are off again. First there was a long stretch of boulders. We have discovered that in the deeper water, where we have a foothold, we can lightly push off instead of firmly placing each foot and it is much easier. At the end of the boulders was our longest stretch of deep water yet, maybe 20 feet deep, and we couldn't even see around the bend to know where it ended. Larry decided that we should hang to the right because it looked like there were some handholds in the bedrock. It was hard going for Larry - holding on to the front of the raft, his new wooden 8 foot staff and trying to find handholds on the rocks. All I could really do was hold on to the back of the raft and kick to try to help move us along. Finally, about half way through the pool Larry saw a spot where he thought he could climb up and over and pull the raft along while I stayed in the water to steady the rear of the raft. A good set of flippers would have come in handy.

He was able to finally climb out and go up and over past the first outcropping ~ I had to keep kicking out toward the middle of the river so that he could pull me and the gear downriver. The next manuver was more difficult. Larry had to climb up a fracture in the rock face like a cat, up and way over an outcropping of bedrock. The river shoes helped him with traction. I had to really push out with my legs and kick hard several times to get beyond the outcroppings at the waterline but finally he was able to pull the raft and me down the river. Once I was adrift I felt like Cleopatra on her barge. It was a little scary because I couldn't see Larry most of the time. Thank goodness for our very long rope. Larry climbed over yet another large abuttment of bedrock and I continued kicking away from the edge. Finally, Larry climbed back down to the river and got in the water because he could see that it was shallow enough for walking in the river and it was gravel. For quite a distance I wasn't able to touch the bottom so he pulled me and the raft along, like Humphey Bogart in the African Queen. This deep pool and grotto area were even more beautiful than the one we saw earlier this morning. We headed to the left bank and found our large gravel bar and wonderful campspot for tonight and this is where we have been since about 1:30.

It is very warm and I am so sleepy. I think I'll go cool off in the river and then take a nap.

Larry: Day 3 Early Morning ~ Early morning, having our cup of tea sitting with our backs against the rock wall that we slept against. Watching the sun catch the tops of the high ridges - comparing pain. Our night was semi-restless, more for Charlotte than me. I had much less trepidation about bears last night as our camp was perched right on the river with steep cliffs above.

I woke up around midnight and we had a nice conversation while watching for meteorites. My body is aching and stiff but my spirit is beginning to embrace our challenge. I guess I'd say that mentally, it's getting easier. Monday night I was filled with fear and trepidation as in, "what have I gotten us into?" And thinking whether or not we were up to this adventure. My male ego wants me to be up to any challenge, no matter how extreme .....but time has taken a toll on my body. 28 years ago, we could have waltzed down the Steven's Trail and laughed at our soreness and bruises. But today, at 58 & 68, they take on new meaning. I am going to concentrate more on the trip and less on how much gold I find. Since the gold has been disappointing so far, I'll look for the treasure of time spent well with my love.

Evening - We moved down river once again - portaging several rapids and a deep pool. I finally had to climb up and over a wall of bedrock and tow the raft through a very deep pool. The problem with those deep holes is the up river wind is much stronger than the current and our feeble kicks ....so, without any purchase on the bank or the bottom, you go upstream! We had literally prayed for an easier day with a nice camp spot and what do you know?! Around the corner appeared an ideal sandy, gravel bar with ample shade (until the late afternoon). We rejoiced over our fairly easy move and our sweet camp.

I rested for an hour or so and then went sniping. Same story - little to no gold. But, we had a marvelous day and now a super camp, time to rest and recuperate. Our water filter is a gem. With it, I can fill a 2 gallon jar in about 10 minutes and our little one liter bottle in 3. Each afternoon I fill the liter bottle with cool river water and we add lemonade powder for an afternoon treat. Do we know how to live or what!?!?

I'm sitting here looking up at the Steven's Trail. It seems like weeks ago that we were struggling our way along it, looking down on this part of the river. I'm bushed. I think that we hadn't rested enough from our barn labors to really be up for this trip. I have a residual fatigue that catches up with me by mid-afternoon.

*** I want to note here that this adventure was a result of a book that Larry purchased.
By the end of the first day I was ready to hurt the author of the book.
By the end of day 2 I wanted to hurt him and make him eat the book.
By day 3, I knew exactly what I wanted to do to him. I wanted to send him down the Steven's Trail with 70 pounds on his back and have him hike, walk, climb, swim, claw and crawl his way to the Iowa Hill Bridge. The floating part in the book sounded so easy..... "floating your gear down the river". Oh, there was soooo much more to it than that.

American River Adventure ~ Day 4

Thursday, August 27, 2009
North Fork of the American River ~ Lots of sun - already HOT!


Charlotte: Early Morning ~ AM with tea ~ Another long night of pain. My body is crying out for a break but we have 2 more - no, 3 more days on the river. My right hand is so sore that I can hardly use it. I think it is from gripping my stick. I take Advil and 2 Sprot before bed and another 2 Advil 4 hours later. It's hard to sleep when you are in pain. I don't want to take the PM medicine to help me sleep for fear I will sleep through the bear coming into camp. I have to keep one ear open and one eye.

My hot flashes are returning because of no flax seed oil and down here on the warm gravel bar, with no fan, all I can do is notice how my body feels. I am really trying to be present with my body and just be an observer. It is easier than living in my body right now. Does that sound strange?

I tried to focus on enjoying the stars until I got drowsy and sometimes I could drift off for a little while. At least we didn't worry about bears here last night. We had the dehydrated beef stew, Mo gave us, for dinner last night - pretty darn good. It was hot in the evening so we sat with our feet in the river for awhile and that seemed to help. After dinner we sat on our pads - MaryAnn, have you heard us saying "thank you" - all week - for telling us to take these garden kneeling pads to sit on? Larry found very little gold yesterday. We have made a huge shift from focusing on the gold. This section of the river has really been worked and as we get closer to the bridge it will be more so.

The first day we saw 2 people on the upper end of the trail on our way down and then Chuck the miner. The second day we saw another miner working on the river and 2 runners (unbelievable - probably training for the Western States 100 miler) and a hiker on the trail. Day 3 we saw a total of 6 people on the river, 3 areas where people camp and mining gear (although they must be out for supplies or something because their things are stashed).

I have noticed that our environment greatly affects what we think about. I am not thinking about Mannatech or painting Arlene's house or even the housesit up in Sutherlin. I spend time in observation of our surroundings, certainly some thoughts about my aches and pains - my body and how to help it out - GET MORE FIT!

Tuesday night we decided to focus on easy and fun and yesterday was easier and more fun. With nothing to read there is plenty of time for listening and observation, conversations, meditation. A good book would be nice but we are both glad that we didn't bring one. "I went to the woods to confront the essential things of life .... so, if this is our mini versin of Walden's Pond what are we learning AND it's NOT about gold. In fact the gold would have distracted us from the lessons - what are the lessons for us in this odyssey? What is really important? Who are we.... really ..... our spirit ..... our essence at the deepest center of our being, without ego and our 58 and 68 years of influence and programming? What do we want to do with the rest of our lives?

I think the hardest part, for me, about this trip is never knowing what is around the next bend - easy or hard? Deep or shallow? Will there be a place to sleep, some shade? Where will we wind up tonight? I can't make a plan because I don't know what's ahead.

About 8 AM - We have decided to strip down to undies, cross over the river, change into dry clothes and hiking boots and go down river before we move. We saw miner #2 hike out yesterday and back in this morning. We aren't sure whether he came from the bridge or down Burnt Flat Trail. We can see the remnants of a forest fire on the tops of the ridges across the river. Smoke filled the canyon last night and drifted over our heads from the ridge behind us. We discussed a plan in case of fire - There was no wind so we weren't really worried.

A little apple for breakfast (fresh apples were NOT a good idea. They are heavy and they are now very bruised from all of the banging around - dried fruit only for future trips. Also, chocolate bars and cheese - BAD idea. They are melted most of the time. By morning they are solid so we have shared a chocolate bar for breakfast 2 mornings.

Day 4 - Later in the day ~ after our move
We have made our way down to the camp spots at the base of Pennyweight Trail. We are exhausted! It is our hottest day yet. After we arrived here, we were burning up, sitting in our camp so with all of the energy we can muster, we put on our river shoes and crossed to the shadey side, where we are, now, sitting in the shade with our feet and legs in the river. It has made a huge difference in cooling us down. Oh, before sitting down, we took a dunk in a pool just down from our sitting spot. The water is coming out of a spring and is very cold.

Our transit/traversing of the river was fairly easy today.

Day 4 - Evening - Before I describe our trip down the river today I must note our change in plans. It is dusk and we have been busy packing - getting ready to head out in the morning. We are in the camp area at the base of the Pennyweight Trail. We have seen lots of people today - lots of folks sniping on the river, young lovers camping (they took our chosen spot before we could pack down river to claim it) and teenagers. A really nice man from Davis, whom we met sniping, hauled an old folding chair up to our camp for us to sit on. It is wonderful! We are taking turns sitting in the chair and it feels great! I never knew a chair could feel so good! We have seen 10 hikers, if you count Chuck, who has been hiking down the river all day looking for cigarettes. We saw the young miner who goes in and out each day and hikes a long distance up river to work. These are hearty souls! We now know that he goes out the Pennyweight Trail because we saw him head out tonight. The man from Davis told us the river below here is really gnarly with 2 drop offs. We have had enough of difficult river transits and portages. We are beat and we will head out very early in the morning and hope to catch a ride to Colfax and call Arlene. We figure if we are up on the road by 7 AM we can catch someone headed into work or school from Iowa Hill.

We are dreaming of an ice cold beer, hot shower and a bed to sleep in. A few clouds are moving in tonight ..... the first clouds we have seen all week.

Larry: Day 4 Early Morning ~ Once again watching the early morning sun light up the tops of the high ridges at yet another camp spot, discussing our plans for the day with our first cup of tea. Saw two kingfishers out early, looking for breakfast, I imagine. The timeless rush of the river and the solid mass of rock around me gives me a sense of transient presence. I look at the water worn masses of bedrock and realize the millions of years that this canyon has been forming. My mere passage is but an insignificant footnote in the life of this canyon. Yet, it is having an enormous impact on me, not only physically but in causing me to examine my priorities, my motives for being here, my limitations. Should we embrace life more like the kingfisher? I doubt they worry about tomorrow or next week. All they care about is eating and shelter - trusting in the fact that they will eat today.

For us, on this, the 4th day, our thoughts are directed more to our progress down river, our sore, stiff muscles and wondering how to put this experience into the context of our lives. Are we meant to take away lessons from this? Does it hold some profound meaning or is it merely another Bacon adventure? I'm feeling very protective of Charlotte but also frustrated at not being able to prevent her suffering. I say I'm responsible for getting us into this but she quickly claims her role in the decision to do this. We have a dilemma this morning - move camp or stay another day. This is such an ideal spot and yet we have at least 2 days of river to get under our belts in order to be on time at the bridge Saturday afternoon. If we stay here another day/night, then we have the added pressure of pressing on Friday and Saturday. But if we opt to head out today, we run the risk of camping at a less than ideal spot.

Day 4 Afternoon - Another move, another camp, another very hot day! I was able to let the raft go down the river on a tether today - much easier than walking it along. There was a long stretch of river, knee deep with plate sized boulders; much easier going. We headed for the camp spot that we had scouted out early in the morning but when we arrived, it had been claimed by a young couple. They had our idylic spot and offered to share but we decided to keep going. So, we pressed overland on down river and found a fairly nice spot under a towering pine. The afternoon sun is unrelenting and shade is scarce so we walked across the river into the shade, where we are sitting with our feet in the water. I was overwhelmed today with the realization that we are going to actually make it through the full week, challenges and all. I felt so proud of us for perservering through it all. But..... actually, what choice did we have?

Day 4 Evening - PS - After spending a scalding afternoon in the hot sun and being beaten up and bruised, the decision has been made to pack it all up and hike out on the Penneyweight Trail. Ironically, the foot of the trail is now 100 yards from our camp. We'll hike out to the road, ride our thumbs into Colfax and call Arlene to come get us. There is no shame in calling this trip over. We did all the hard parts and I'm very proud of both of us.

American River Adventure ~ Day 5

Friday, August 28, 2009
Chicago Park, CA

Charlotte: Friday Morning ~ Out of the canyon! First I want to write about our extraordinary morning. Here we are at Tofte Ranch at 11.26 AM and showered. First we enjoyed a wonderful cup of coffee on the porch, sitting in chairs. Only 4 days without coffee, has made a huge difference in our appreciation of our morning cup but I think the challenge of our trip played a part in that. We savor the flavor and aroma - we are present with our cup of coffee. Sitting on chairs with cushions on the porch - ahhhh, so comfortable and relaxing. A little snack of coffee cake left over from Arlene's Bunco night - really good coffee cake, I might add, some beef and green olives, also from Arlene's Bunco night. Then, finally a long hot shower - mmmmmmmm. It felt like we needed to scrub everywhere twice to get the camp dirt off and the hot water felt luxurious. All clean again, we took a survey of each other's bodies checking out the scrapes, bruises and bites. Larry has some really large angry bites on his torso. We carry the marks of our trip but mostly we are sore and bone weary tired.

Our trip out was amazing - miraculous in retrospect. After a long painful and agonizing night for both of us, daylight finally arrived. We spent a wakeful night of moans and groans, a few conversations, lots of tossing and turning, checking the time, watching the stars and clouds in the sky and a few short fitful periods of sleep. It never cooled down last night.

Arlene is NOT home. We forgot she was headed to Sacramento on Friday. I have to say it is so perfect that Arlene isn't home and also perfect that we didn't remember. I have been saying that ever since we lost out on our perfect campspot yesterday "Everything is working out in a perfect way" - even having someone else take the campspot we were drooling over.... while we were hauling our gear down river. I remember the dejected look on Larry's face when he turned to me and said "Someone is in our camp spot." I decided rather than choose the frustration, anger and disappointment, I would claim "Everything is working out in a perfect way."

And now here we are alone at Arlene's with time to clean up, talk, reflect, be quiet, write and rest AND we wouldn't have met our 2 special angels - if Arlene had been home and we hadn't decided to come out of the canyon a day early.

Larry: Up at the first sign of light, rolled up our bed, got it all packed up and we are headed up the PW Trail by 6:30. The trail was lots rougher than our friend intimated but by awakening our tired muscles, we climbed out of the canyon. We waited maybe 20 minutes before our first angel stopped to give us a lift into Colfax. Craig was a typical Iowa Hillian with full mustache and beard, long, shoulder length hair, cut-offs and thongs. We had to hold the seat belts across our bodies because they didn't work and he didn't want to get a ticket. His pick-up was so high off the ground I had to give Charlotte a boost from behind to get her up and in the truck. The truck smelled of cigarettes, diesel and dust and old wet dog, which I suspect usually rides in our area of the seat. Craig shared stories of how he found Iowa Hill before going off to prison and how he had returned as soon as he got out of prison. Everyone has a story to tell if you just ask the right questions. Interesting! Charlotte's first comment after Craig dropped us off and drove away was, "What would my mother say?" and after a chuckle..... "CHARLOTTE, WHAT WERE YOU THINKING????!!!"

Craig dropped us off at the Chevron Station in Colfax, where we had planned on phoning Arlene to come get us. The pay phone was missing from the booth, so we decided to hike around to Hwy. 174 and hold up a Chicago Park sign.

8 AM in Colfax is probably the busiest time of day, what with dropping kids off at school and people heading down to Auburn for work. We got lots of looks from the long lines of cars at the 4 way stop. Us, in our dusty clothers, with packs on our backs, hiking sticks in hand, bandanas and caps on our head. Some folks acted like they didn't see us, others stared us down with grim looks of disapproval on their faces, while others smiled and waved or gave us a thumbs up and some even offered encouraging comments. I wondered what stories they were telling about these 2 middle aged people walking through Colfax, California on a Friday morning with packs on their backs?

We made our way around to 174 and held up our sign. Very quickly our second angel stopped. Suzzette, a hair stylist and her 2 dogs gave us a lift out to the tiny Chicago Park Store, even though she didn't live in that direction! At the CP store, I asked the proprietor if I could use the phone to call our friend, Arlene, but got her answering machine. I left a message thinking she was out feeding cows. In another little bit I asked to use the phone again..... still no answer. After about 45 minutes, our 3rd angel stopped and offered to buy us some breakfast. Kelly thought we were homeless and assumed I was a vet and wanted to help out. I explained our situation. It seems she is an old backpacker and now packs folks in to the backcountry of the Sierras with horses. Kelly gave us a lift all the way to Arlene's! We felt a kinship with Kelly.

We were sitting on the front porch, clean from our hot showers, with a cup of coffee by 10 AM!!! Thanks to our band of angels. We toasted each other with our coffee for a job well done. Thank you God for our week of adventure and discovery and thank You for bringing us safely out of the canyon!